Menards is a great place to get free items. To find out how to take advantage of the freebies offered at Menards, read here. Currently 68 items are advertised with rebates, giving you a great opportunity to get what you need at a great price!

Kellogg's is doing several rebates on cereals right now. In the past week, I've been able to purchase five boxes, all of which will be free (unless you count the stamp, but even then, it's a great deal!).

Today was a fun day out. We went shopping, and we turned it into a "scan date" using Shopkick and Checkpoints on Josh's iphone. We were able to get some excellent deals today, and we also walked 3.94 miles, which I consider success!

Our first stop was Walgreens, where we wanted to take advantage of their January coupons expiring.
We had to do two transactions because our coupons had a limit of 4 per transaction (had I read that before, I could have gotten an even better deal, but I still did well.).

5 Crest Pro-Health (-$2 Walgreens coupon x 5) (-$2 manufacturer's coupon x 5), regularly $4.99, now $.99
4 pencils (original filler) $1/4--I'll take these to school for my students to buy with their tokens in the class store
3 Snickers--these were because I had to do a second transaction after everything else was rung up, and I had $2RR expiring today. One is for me. The others will be a special snack I'll send to work with Josh (I send him with snacks every few weeks so that he can resist the temptation of the vending machines at work)Total: $2.95 + tax, savings of $25.39

Our next stop was at Wal-Mart, but not to buy anything. We had a Field Agent job for $4 to take a picture of a makeup display. It took about two minutes, and then we wandered the store scanning things for Checkpoints. Between all of our scans and our Field Agent job, we probably earned about $8 today, which was nice. It's not often you make money shopping.

Then we went to Meijer. We did two transactions to take advantage of mPerks, as we both had -$1.00 on Oscar Mayer carving board meats (plus -$2 coupons from Facebook).

Total Cost: $4.16
I'll be using these tomorrow for freezer cooking when I make cooked apples to mix in with baked oatmeal and for apple pie muffins for Josh to take to work on Monday (he apparently volunteered to bring muffins for breakfast).

Target was our next destination.

I went there planning to buy Kellogg's Crunchy Nut cereal (if I could find it with the rebate, which, obviously, I did, plus I had a -$1 coupon), Rimmel make up (I had a Target coupon for -$2, plus two -$2 coupons from Facebook, and a BOGO coupon for nail polish from All You), and Shout wipes (-$.50 Target coupon and -$.55 manufacturer's coupon), which will be going to work with Josh. While scanning items, we came across the clearance shoe section and found each of us a pair of boots (his: $7.48, mine: $9.98). Neither of us has a pair of boots, so this was a good deal. They're not the most beautiful, but they're perfect for shoveling the driveway.Total: $19.50 plus tax. $16.51 after a $2.99 rebate for the cereal.

Our final stop was at Bath and Body Works, which is giving away free candles this weekend. We both printed the Facebook coupon, so we got 2 free.

These are going into my stocking stuffer box, along with my make up purchase from Target. These will make great little gifts come Christmas.Total: Free (regularly priced $3.50, for a savings of $7)

January is a time for new beginnings, though I suppose that could be said about many times of year--spring with life re-emerging, August/September with school restarting, etc, so I guess any time you're ready to restart is a time for new beginnings, but now is our time.

Our new beginning starts with Josh's new job. After being under-employed for the past year and a half after earning his master's degree (he's been working as an adjunct at a local community college), he now has a full time job. This is a huge change for us. We'll be better off financially, but we're losing much of the time we used to spend together, so it's a huge adjustment. We've been used to having him home much of the time, and he's been able to run errands whenever, take care of the house, and just do anything that's needed done. That's changing now, as he's working 45+ hours a week, so we're discovering a new balance of running the household, and I'm having to take much more responsibility for it, which I'm not sure he's loving (I have much higher standards than he does when it comes to taking care of the house).

We're also getting our finances in better order. This is a journey we started last year. Our immediate goals are to have the car paid off by July and to start setting aside $100/month to increase our emergency savings account. We're also going to be paying cash for my master's degree, which I'll start this summer. All of our increased income from Josh's job will be going towards meeting these goals.

We're taking control over our health, too. I'm making a big effort to cook more of our meals from scratch, so we can avoid food filled with preservatives and also eat out less, which saves money and calories. We're also working out more. I mainly stick to walking, but Josh has been doing an amazing job with EA Sports Active 2 on the Wii. It has a heart monitor, unlike the other workout "games," so it does a much better job calculating actual calories burned. He's been waking up at five most mornings to work out before work, and he's generally burning 400+ calories, which is great. I need to use him as inspiration to do more.

So join us on our journey to take control of our lives, and share your journeys with us, too, as you do the same.